


An Eye for an Eye

by verboseDescription



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Introspection, internalized ableism, me smacking juno steel on the back: dont accept coping mechanisms from strangers!, mostly like, not as dark as it could have been, small amounts of, thoughts about the new season
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-16
Updated: 2017-04-16
Packaged: 2018-10-19 19:11:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10646229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verboseDescription/pseuds/verboseDescription
Summary: Juno should know by now that no gift he gets comes for free





	An Eye for an Eye

He takes you to a place where you feel afraid, a place that shakes you in a way you had desperately been trying to forget you could be shaken, and then offers you a way to protect yourself.

It takes Juno a week to recover from meeting Ramses, and a week longer to realize that there had been something that needed to be recovered from, but even than he doesn’t do anything. I mean, why would he?

Ramses giving Juno an eye was like him giving a starving man food.

Even if that food was poisoned, you still wanted to take it, because you were just so damn _hungry._

Ramses O’Flaherty wasn’t playing Juno Steel like a fiddle. No, he was playing him like a fucking _symphony._

 

 

 

Fuck.

 

 

 

There’s a special kind of pain that comes with losing something that used to make up so much of you. Juno had gotten by in his life mainly on luck and his keen eyes, and now that one of them was gone, he couldn’t imagine the other would last much longer.

But then Ramses had given him an _eye._

And because he’s such a fucking idiot, he thinks this’ll make things better. That the cut of knowing you’d never be anything like you used to would sting a little less if you had this, this _one thing_.

Feeling good isn’t the point.

But he’d really appreciate feeling a little better.

 

 

 

Most of the time, Juno likes his new eye. It’s cool as hell.

All of the things it can do, all of the things it can let him do—Juno doesn’t think he’s ever been this good at his job in his life.

It’s a good thing.

Juno doesn’t trust good things.

 

 

 

He dreams about Nureyev, mad as hell. Juno knows he has every right to be.

He dreams about Nureyev laughing at his eye, and calling him a cyborg.

He dreams about Nureyev, laughing at his eyepatch, and calling him a cyclops.

Juno doesn’t know which one stings more.

At least a cyborg can do _something._

 

 

 

Rita can see there’s a change in him. He doesn’t seem _happier,_ he knows _that,_ but he’s more… focused. More driven.

It’s easy to pretend there’s not a bribe sitting on one side of his face when he’s doing something. He’s taking on more cases. Maybe (definitely) pushing himself a little too hard.

But he’s saving the day. And that’s what he’s here for, isn’t it?

Ramses seems proud, at the very least.

Too bad knowing that makes Juno feel sick to his stomach.

 

 

 

Things that Juno Steel finds familiar:

  1. Disappointment
  2. Lies
  3. Hangovers
  4. Bribery
  5. Death hanging over his head like the constant layer of smog in the air
  6. Ramses O’Flaherty



He knows better than to trust “familiar.”

 

 

 

Juno’s not an idiot. He tells Rita about the database in his eye. Rita’s got enough to say to host twenty streams and doesn’t understand what the term “sensitive information” means, but he trusts her.

And he trusts her programs.

Juno’ll admit it: he doesn’t know _shit_ about computers, and that includes whatever system they’ve got in his eye. But Rita does.

Ramses said not to tell anyone, but _fuck_ him.

Juno knows he’s going to get screwed over one way or another, and he’s going to find out how.

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s one of Juno’s favorite sayings: If things seem too good to be true, it’s because they are.

He just needs to know Ramses’ _angle._

 

 

 

 

 

Juno doesn’t always listen to the news.

Doesn’t always pay attention to what’s in front of him.

Doesn’t always _care_ , either—I mean, what’s a few new politicians going to change?

He thinks—

He thinks Ramses probably knows that.

 

 

 

 

 _”You can look into me on your own time,”_ he had said. _“but I can’t guarantee you’ll like what you find.”_

 

 

 

 

Fuck.

 

 

 

**_Fuck._ **

 

 

 

Ramses really _did_ want to help people, he says, it’s just, some people don’t want to be helped the way he wants to help them. And some people just want to stop him from being helpful.

Everyone Juno helps put away is dirty, but something like that means nothing in a place like Hyperion, where everyone’s stuck their hands in one pile or filth or another. He should have realized.

Ramses had gotten Juno to do all his campaigning for him.

Who wants to elect someone who was caught just the other day smuggling goods?

Who wants to elect someone a _brilliant detective_ just proved was taking bribes?

No, no, the people aren’t idiots. They want someone they can trust, or at least someone who knows how to hide his dirty laundry.

So the people want Ramses O’Flaherty.

I mean, after all, the guy gave that PI a prosthetic out of the goodness of his heart, didn’t he? He can’t be _all_ that bad, could he? And hey, thanks to his good will, look how many crooks got behind bars!

 

Like a fucking _symphony._

 

Juno remembers seeing Brahma through Nureyev’s eyes.

Things changed so quickly, but they also changed so _slow._

He blames himself for not being able to do anything sooner, but he was only a child than, manipulated by someone who had said he was doing the right thing, and he believed.

I mean, of course he believed. Why wouldn’t he?

Who doesn’t want to believe they come from greatness, believe that they were destined to change the world, that a _real parent_ wouldn’t ever abandon a kid like you without a reason?

But life’s not like that.

People who say they want to help always end up fucking something up—sometimes it’s Funland, and you keep your life but you get your nightmares too, sometimes it’s a fucking angel, brought to life by people thinking that they can save people by killing them all.

And sometimes it’s just an old man who promises too much and says too little and you stay by his side because where else would you go?

 

 

Juno thought that Ramses would turn him into a crook. That if someone needed to take the blame for something, it’d be him, but it’s much worse than that.

Ramses turns him into a _hero._

No one realizes that anyone can be a hero so long as the only things they know about you are things they like to hear.

 

 

 

No one can find any dirt on Ramses. For all they know, he’s the perfect mayor, a mayor who doesn’t remind detectives about their trauma to get what they want, or bribe someone by giving them the _one_ thing they want most and tainting it because now it’s just another thing that reminds you of how _easy_ it is to use you, how _desperate_ you are to do some good, to _be_ good, that you let yourself brush off any bad feelings you had because you’re drowning in so much fucking self-hatred you don’t care if he hurts you, as if someone who wants to see the world bleed cares where the blood is coming from, as if that wasn’t what all politicians wanted, beneath their wide smiles and fake promises, because they were all the same, every single fucking one of them, and he—

He just—

 

Ramses wins the election by a landslide.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That’s politics for you.

**Author's Note:**

> As soon as i really realized what a dick move meeting at the park was I had such an intense hatred of ramses that i wanted to reach into the podcast and scream in his face.  
> idk what he's planning, and this is really just focusing on the political aspect of it i guess?? i dont think Juno's going to end up like, actually in trouble from him, partially because i think that seems a bit against what we know about him as of now? doesnt mean juno'll end up any happier  
> Also as a disabled person who's like, losing the ability to do something I was previously fond of & spent a fair amount of time doing, because of said disability, I have a lot of feelings about giving Juno a new eye. I think tpp will go a good direction with it, or at least an interesting direction, but I don't think its like, the best choice juno could have made? you shouldnt feel forced into an accessability device, if that makes sense.


End file.
